An understanding of renewable sources of

Transcript:An understanding of renewable sources of:
An understanding of renewable sources of electricity Mike Hemsley Committee on Climate Change An overview of renewable electricity What we will cover: Technology types: variable renewables & other types of renewables Technology costs & potential scale System design 2 Low-carbon electricity options 3 Variable renewables are the cheapest source of electricity 4 Other renewables can offer constant output, but have limited potential 5 We need to produce the same amount of electricity as we're using at all times This becomes more difficult with variable renewable energy, as there may be times when its not windy or not sunny, or times when there is too much energy for the system to cope with. Why the system needs to change 6 Adding ‘system flexibility’ can help: Battery storage can store electricity to use at a later time Changing when we use electricity (e.g. for electric vehicles), can move electricity consumption to a more ‘useful’ time for the system Building electricity cables to other countries allows countries to share resources and solutions Gas power plants can respond to changes in output from renewables, and act as a backup source of generation. Adding flexibility to the system 7 An overview of renewable electricity What we covered: Technology types: variable renewables & other types of renewables Technology costs & potential scale System design 8 Conclusions Variable renewables are the cheapest source of electricity Wind and solar are currently the best options producing renewable electricity at scale System design needs to change in a low-carbon world 9